This blog of mine focuses on Japanese cooking. I'm h_312_312 on Instagram and Hiro312 on cookpad.
私のこのブログでは、日本料理を扱います。インスタグラムではh_312_312、クックパッドではHiro312です。

January 24, 2018

Ugly Anti-Whaling Countries/醜い反捕鯨国

When will the anti-whaling countries realize that the problem lies in themselves? When will they realize that they are ugly, rude, barbarous, unscientific, emotional, and culturally imperialistic, trying to impose their narrow-minded views on the whaling countries and disrespecting the cultures of these countries? When will they stop taking the arrogant attitude and start talking about sustainable whaling?
反捕鯨国は、いつになったら、問題は自分たち自身にあることを認識するのでしょうか？いつになったら、自分たちは醜く、無礼で、野蛮で、非科学的で、感情的で、文化帝国主義的であり、また自分たちの偏狭な考えを捕鯨国に押し付け、捕鯨国の文化を軽視していることを認識するのでしょうか？いつになったら、傲慢な態度を取るのを止め、持続可能な捕鯨について語り始めるのでしょうか？

The anti-whaling movement is a gross human rights abuse akin to colonization and slavery.
反捕鯨運動は、植民地化や奴隷制にも似た大きな人権侵害です。

Not only whales but also all other animals, as well as all plants, are special in their own way, regardless of their intelligence. It is totally wrong to attempt to rank living creatures according to intelligence. We all need to sacrifice the lives of other creatures to sustain our own. This is just a fact of life.
クジラだけでなく、他の全ての動物も、並びに全ての植物も、その知能に係らず特別なものです。生き物を知能でランク付けしようとするのは全くの誤りです。私たちは誰でも、自分たちの生命を維持するため他の生き物の命を犠牲にする必要があります。それが厳然たる事実です。

It is pathetically ironic that the present-day anti-whaling countries, which used to hunt whales in large numbers only for their oil and baleen and never worshiped them, now accuse Japan, which has worshipped whales and consumed every part of every whale.
かつて、油やヒゲを取るためだけに鯨を大量に捕っていても、鯨を崇拝したことのない反捕鯨国が、鯨を崇拝し、鯨の全ての部分を消費していた日本を非難するのは、痛ましいほどに皮肉なものです。

9 comments:

Anonymous
said...

I think a discussion about sustainable whaling would be great. I agree with you that there is a focus on imperialistic judgment when it comes to discussing whaling in the West (I'm based in the US). That judgment is based on characterizing whaling as, as you say, barbaric and unconcerned with the consequences of reckless whaling.

I've been hesitant to comment on your posts about whaling, because of my lack of knowledge about it, and because I think the general sentiment in the US is that whaling is outright wrong, and that any whaling that occurs is barbaric. However, as with so many other practices around the world, that sentiment isn't really based in a knowledge of culture. If a discussion about sustainable whaling were to occur, along with education of the meaning of whaling in Japanese and other cultures, an understanding based on respect of culture and sustainability might be achieved. - Amy

Hi,I think the problem in the West is the lack of information on such a topic and people just automatically assume the worst. In a bad case, I was speaking with someone who said whaling was similar to shark finning (where they remove the fin and put the live, harmed shark back in the water) Of course this is far from the truth.

To be honest, it's difficult to have such a conversation here because most people are not exposed to it. There was a recent scandal here in Toronto, Ontario where I live and a restaurant was serving a raw seal dish. The reason is this was a traditional inuit restaurant and serving a dish that is very important to their culture. They obtain the meat from a sustainable meat provider but it didn't matter.

To some people, it is such a one-sided argument.That being said, I don't think you can lump together a whole country based on the misguided ideals of a small group of people.

I have refrained from talking about whaling for so long for fear of stupid comments from anti-whaling people, but now I think I have to speak up to defend my country and its culture related to whaling because of all those silly YouTube videos like this:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LbRoCFlNfkQMost Racist Australian Commercialand all those stupid comments about whaling in Japan that are on the Internet.

In future posts, I will be blunter, using strong words and referring to specific country names such as the UK, the US, and Australia.

That was one of the most awful things I've ever seen :( And the comments were equally horrible too - there's no denying how racist that commercial was, regardless on anyone's stance on whaling. And what on earth does whaling have to do with beer??

I think one reason why it's hard for a lot of people in the West to discuss whaling knowledgeably is because much of the discussion about whaling is prompted by animal rights activists who take very extreme views and actions with regard to their beliefs. Here's an example of how animal rights extremism is covered in the US - http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2014/03/animal-rights-extremists-increasingly-targeting-individuals.

If discussions of the regulation of world-wide whaling were happening in the purview of government authorities acting reasonably and with the objective advice and observations of scientists and other environmental experts, then I think the larger public could, in turn, learn more about whaling and especially its role in Japanese culture. Unfortunately, animal rights extremists like the creators of that horrible commercial taint such a discussion and make it difficult for members of the public to learn about whaling in a more objective fashion.

Stacy D, it's so interesting that you brought up the consumption of seals in Inuit culture - that's exactly what I was thinking of when I wrote my first comment! I first learned about it when Anthony Bourdain featured it on his TV shows. It goes to show that a little cultural understanding can go a long way in understanding and accepting practices that you may not be used to! - Amy

Thanks for the link. I learned about animal rights extremism and I also learned about the seal served at a restraurant in Toronto.

I think that the whaling issue is different from the two issues in that 1) As for whaling, anti-whaling countries act like animal rights activists at the International Whaling Commission (IWC) and 2) Mass media overseas is very biased against whaling.

The only people I knew that eat dog meat was Korean, but after reading the dog meat entry in Wikipidiahttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog_meatI realized that dog meat is consumed in many parts of the world!

Dog Meat is a Staple in many parts of N. E. India. Cats are eaten by the Filipinos. People eat all sought of creatures. It is upto them to decide if they are doing it right or wrong. It is a matter of existence in some cases or purely choice of some. Some are customs and traditions. The anti-whaling countries might have some terrible things going on in their countries which they could look into. For instance in US, innocent people are murdered because of the Gun Control rules there. It is man slaughter. Humans should consider these things first before they voice against killing whales.